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| A good beer at the end of a long day of work is essential to keeping your gardener happy |
I appreciate the principals behind a no-till garden, and the whole bit about killing microbes when you bring them to the surface makes tons of sense to me. Still, I find a garden that has been tilled so much easier to work in, and double-digging the best way to prep the ground & kill the weeds.
We did not till up this garden this year, and it wouldn't be necessary (although would have made planting much faster). I double-dug most of the soil and you can tell when the shovel hits the dirt how soft the soil is, this has been a properly cared for and used garden.
I'm expecting that because it's obviously been used year after year we're going to need some extra organic content; but right now my best plan should be to take a soil sample to the local extension office for testing.
In the mean time, we're all moved into the new place and I've already got all my little seedlings into the ground. Hubby also ran out and grabbed me a bunch more pepper plants, and they put my little stunted started seeds to shame! We'll see if my guys can catch up, but I'd be pretty surprised if they did.
If I had to do it all over again, I would probably have started with a seed starting method that didn't end up mildewing! But I would start & move my seedlings again. It was pretty easy & I still have plants to go in the ground that may need a little help late-summer/early-fall to keep going, but I should get a half-decent harvest from them.
And our giant pumpkin is already pretty large! Here's hoping we've got a good whopper.
For this year we have:
- bush beans (yellow & green)
- lettuce
- cherry & eating tomatoes
- green & yellow peppers
- hopefully 1 jalapeno pepper plant
- cauliflower & broccoli
- zucchini, spaghetti, pumpkins,
(I lost the tags to a few so should be a good surprise!)
- cucumber
- atlantic giant pumpkin!
+ Established plantings I'll blog about later.
